Six Nigerian children in hiding in Athlone
Friday, 25 March 2005
Six Nigerian children, who are wanted by the Garda Immigration Bureau for a deportation order, are still in hiding in the midlands, ten days after gardaí searched a school there.
Staff at Our Lady's Bower secondary college in Athlone have said students were left in uproar after the gardaí stormed into a classroom looking for a Nigerian girl.
An appeal has also been made for the girl's mother and another Nigerian woman to be allowed return to Ireland after she was deported on the same day. The two were deported to Lagos last week.
The calls come in the light of Minister for Justice Michael McDowell's decision to bring back Olukunle Elukanlo to sit his Leaving Cert.
Two Athlone-based Nigerian families were broken up when mothers Elizabeth Odunsi and Iyabo Nwanze were among 35 people deported to Nigeria on 14 March.
The two women each brought one of their children with them, but their other children were left behind.
Ms Nwanze's son Emmanuel (8), and Ms Odunsi's children Mabajoye (18), Oluwaseun (14), and Olwasegun (11), are all in hiding in the midlands to avoid deportation.
The women had been rearing the children on their own.
A campaign has been launched to bring back Ms Odunsi and Ms Nwanze to their families.
- Five Seven Live: Listen to the comments and emails from programme listeners on the issue of the deportation and subsequent visa-granting of Olunkunle Eluhanla
- Five Seven Live: Philip Bouncher-Hayes talks to members of the Nigerian community in Athlone, Co Westmeath
- News At One: Dennis Rowan from the newly formed group, Communities Against Injustice, discusses the trauma faced by the families after the deportation of Elizabeth Odunzi and Iyabo Nwanze
- News At One: Noel Casey, Vice-Principal of Our Lady's Bower Secondary School in Athlone, discusses the situation for the Odunzi and Nwanze families
- Nine News: Ciaran Mullooly, Midlands Correspondent, reports as six Nigerian children remain in hiding
- Six One News: Ciaran Mullooly, Midlands Correspondent, reports on the appeals for the Odunsi and Nwanze families
- One News: Ciarán Mullooly, Midlands Correspondent, reports on the anger at the manner in which the gardaí have searched for Nigerian children in Athlone schools
